


Sincerely, Yours

by Asgardsrevengers



Category: MCU, Marvel, sambucky - Fandom
Genre: Angst, M/M, SamCap, character list will be updated with new chapters, in a previous life sequel, sambucky - Freeform, trigger warnings will also be placed at the beginning of the appropriate chapters, tw for ptsd depression and mentions of suicidal thoughts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:54:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25226407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asgardsrevengers/pseuds/Asgardsrevengers
Summary: SEQUEL TO “IN A PREVIOUS LIFE”Steve, now an old man, has left to live the rest of his life out on a quiet farm, leaving Sam and Bucky to deal with the aftermath of the “blip”. While Sam shoulders the duty of Captain America, a burden that weighs heavy on them both, Bucky continues learning how to live in the new world as he finds himself again. Together, they do their best to protect their fragile world from further attack while also navigating the tricky waters of their relationship.
Relationships: Sam Wilson/Bucky Barnes, sambucky
Comments: 8
Kudos: 9





	1. A Lifetime of Reparations

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to the first chapter of my “In a Previous Life” sequel! If you haven’t read IPL yet, hop over to my profile and you’ll find it. This fic has been in the works for over 8 months (though I did step away from it for awhile to focus on other things) but I’m finally ready to post the first chapter, and am planning to post one chapter each week following. I had a blast writing this, so I hope you all enjoy reading! As always, feedback and constructive criticism are welcomed.

_ Six months after the events of Endgame _

_ Washington, April 2024  _

Bucky fixes his tie for the tenth time this morning. He stares at himself in the mirror, eyes heavy. His hair is short again, and his beard has been shaved for at least a month now. He looked like his old self again. He wasn’t sure if he liked that or not. The only things that didn’t match his old look were the dark bags under his eyes, as if they belonged to a much older man than himself, and the vibranium prosthetic arm hanging at his side. The U.S. government had tried to confiscate the arm after Bucky came back, claiming it was a dangerous weapon, but T’challa refused to let them take it, telling them it was property of Wakanda, and if they touched it they’d be hit with a lawsuit from the best legal team money could buy. 

Bucky hears a sigh behind him before two arms wrap around his waist. 

“Stop messing with your tie, it was fine the first time.”

He looks at Sam in the mirror, swallowing the lump in his throat. 

“Sorry.”

Sam smiles sympathetically. “It’s ok.”

Bucky turns so he’s facing Sam. His mouth turns down and Sam reaches up, brushing his fingers through Bucky’s hair. “It’s gonna be ok,” he says quietly. “You’re gonna be fine.”

Bucky closes his eyes and exhales deeply. “If things don’t go our way, I don’t want you to wait for me, ok?”

“Don’t say that,” Sam tells him, frowning deeply. “Everything’s gonna work out.”

“Sam, we have to be ready just in case-”

“Bucky, please,” Sam begs, voice just above a whisper. “I can’t think about that. Please.”

Bucky nods, trying to ignore the knot in his stomach. 

“Ok.” He kisses Sam, slow and hesitant. “Ok, we won’t think about that.”

  
  


An hour later, Bucky sits at a polished wooden table, staring down at it intensely. A quiet buzz of voices fills his ears. The room is full of people he’d met the past few years. 

Shuri sat with T’challa, Okoye, and Nakia in the front of the room. Pepper Potts was beside James Rhodes and Happy Hogan in the back. 

Bucky also spotted Scott Lang, Clint Barton, and Nick Fury. Directly behind Bucky sat Sam. 

They’d all come to testify for him in the case of United States v. Barnes. He was being tried for his crimes as The Winter Soldier, and today the jury voted on the matter of his innocence. 

T’challa had been gracious enough to offer Wakanda’s best legal team, and Shuri was happy to testify on Bucky’s recovery. 

Bucky looks over at her, smiling gratefully when she catches his eye. 

He remembers her testimony by heart, could probably recite it if he needed. 

_ “Ms. Udaku, is it true you oversaw Mr. Barnes’ recovery while he was in Wakanda’s care?” Bucky’s lawyer asks.  _

_ Shuri nods her head once.  _

_ “Yes, that’s correct.” _

_ “And can you describe to the court what Mr. Barnes was like when you first started caring for him?” _

_ “He was confused,” Shuri says. “He didn’t know who he was or what his purpose was. His mind was not in the right place.” _

_ The lawyer nods his head. “Could you confidently say that Mr. Barnes was not in control of his actions while under HYDRA’s watch?” _

_ “He was absolutely not in any control,” Shuri answers, shaking her head lightly. “HYDRA had programmed him to comply to their orders, there was nothing he could do to escape their control.” _

_ “And would you say that Mr. Barnes is now fully aware and in control of his thoughts and actions?” _

_ Shuri nods her head. “Yes. I’ve done numerous tests, analyzed his brain activity and responses to previous triggers; he’s of perfectly sound mind.”  _

Shuri returns the smile, her eyes holding a kind reassurance. 

Bucky looks around the room once more. No matter the outcome of the case, he was grateful he had so many people on his side. Many of them were unexpected allies. Namely, Pepper Potts. She was one Bucky hadn’t expected to vouch for him, especially given his past with Tony. 

_ Pepper sat at the witness stand, back straight and lips pulled into a thin, professional line.  _

_ The prosecutor stood before her.  _

_ “Miss Potts, I’d like to start by asking you about your late husband, Tony Stark.” _

_ Pepper's lip twitches, but she remains professional.  _

_ “Alright.” _

_ “Is it true that Mr. Stark was aware that Mr. Barnes was the cause of his parent’s deaths?” _

_ Pepper raises her brow. “He was aware that The Winter Soldier was the cause of his parents death.” _

_ “Did he ever communicate that to you?” _

_ “Yes.” Pepper nods her head once. “A while after the fallout with Steve Rogers, we had a conversation about it. He was heartbroken about the whole thing, obviously aware after the fact that The Winter Soldier and James Barnes were not the same person. He felt guilty that he’d reacted the way he did, but he wasn’t exactly thinking straight at the time. If he were here today, I’m confident he would vouch for Mr. Barnes.” _

Bucky exhales as the judge enters the courtroom. 

“All rise for the honorable Judge Witham.”

Everyone rises before being told to sit again. Bucky’s stomach was in knots. He looked toward the judge expectantly. 

“After days of contemplation, the jury has reached maybe the most difficult decision this court has seen,” Judge Witham announces. He looks toward the foreman, who stands up, straight and professional. 

Bucky’s stomach twists with anxiety. He drums the fingers of his flesh hand on the table silently. Beside him, his lawyer places a comforting hand on his arm. 

“We, the jury...” the foreman begins. Bucky swallows as his chest tightens. “...have found The Winter Soldier guilty on all charges brought before the court.”

Bucky’s heart falls. Everything seems to fade out and move in slow motion. The voices and shouts of the disappointed patrons are drowned out, sounding almost as if he’s underwater. Bucky turns slowly and looks at Sam, who was barely holding back tears. 

Judge Witham pounds his gavel and everyone quiets down. The foreman speaks up again. 

“Though we have found The Winter Soldier guilty of these crimes, we have found Mr. Barnes innocent due to the obvious intervention of HYDRA technology, that of which he had no control over.”

Bucky looks up, brows furrowed in hopeful confusion. 

“To elaborate,” the foreman continues. “since we found The Winter Soldier guilty, and all compiled evidence suggests there is no longer a Winter Soldier, James Barnes is free of all charges and will be put on probation for an appropriate time set by the court on a later date.”

Bucky just about bursts into tears. The entire courtroom stands up to congratulate him at once, their excited voices all melding together. 

Bucky turns just as Sam pulls him into a tight hug. He feels the dampness of Sam’s tears on his shoulder, realizing he’s crying as well. 

Sam holds onto Bucky as tightly as he can, bunching the material of Bucky’s suit in his fists. He wants to scream with glee at the top of his lungs, but he settles for the quiet sobs that escape his lips as he presses his face into Bucky’s neck. 

Later, they celebrate Bucky’s newfound freedom by going out for a drink. Their friends join them, all inexplicably happy for the both of them and the new future they now had together. 

Bucky notices how Sam orders a ginger ale for himself instead of alcohol. In fact, he doesn’t touch a drink all night. If Bucky’s memory served him, he never remembered Sam shying away from a drink or two. Bucky files that away to ask Sam about later, when they’re alone. 

Sam wakes up in the early morning between three and four am the next day. He rolls over, feels the empty space beside him on the bed. 

“Buck?” he mumbles into the dark. He opens his eyes to find that Bucky isn’t there. “Bucky?” Sam sits up and searches the bathroom and kitchen. Still, Bucky was nowhere to be found. 

Panic began to set in. Sam remembers the day Bucky left all those years ago, and he feared it had happened all over again. 

He searches the rest of their tiny apartment, looking for Bucky to no avail. 

Finally, he finds Bucky on the stairwell, hunched over, shoulders shaking. He calms his racing heart before starting down the steps. From where he stood, he could see smoke wafting up into the air, could smell the familiar scent of cigarettes. He makes his way down the rest of the steps and sits beside Bucky, placing his hands in his lap. 

Bucky doesn’t look at him, but hands him the cigarette. Sam lifts it to his lips, taking a long drag. It had been a long time since he’d even let one of these things pass between his lips. The last tangible memory he has of smoking is when he and Riley would sit just outside base, passing a cigarette between the two of them as they talked about anything that might have been on their minds at the time. 

“Thought you were done smoking.” Bucky’s voice is hoarse, and it pulls Sam from his thoughts. “You know they’re bad for you now.”

Sam chuckles humorlessly. “They’ve always been bad.” He taps the cigarette with his forefinger, watching as a small trail of ash falls to the step below him. “We just know it now.”

“I found them in your sock drawer.”

“They’re for emergencies.” 

Bucky doesn’t lift his head, and Sam knows this isn’t about the cigarettes. He puts it out and sets it on the step below him. 

“Why are you up anyways?”

“Couldn’t sleep.” Bucky shrugs. He pulls another cigarette from the carton, lighting it despite Sam’s sigh. “What about you?”

“Just woke up and you weren’t there.”

A flash of guilt crosses Bucky’s face as he blows out a puff of smoke before taking another drag. Sam looks at him, catches the glimmer of tear tracks on his cheeks, and his own heart begins to ache. 

Things between them these past six months had been alright, they got through their days together, mostly waiting for the trial to finally be over. Now that it was, Sam was left wondering what they were moving towards now. Him becoming Captain America? He hadn’t even picked up the shield since Steve gave it to him, and he still felt unworthy of it for some reason. After Tony’s funeral, Nick Fury had pulled him aside, offered to let him work with SHIELD, just like Steve had, but Sam was weary, and rightfully so. SHIELD wasn’t even an official organization anymore, just a bunch of rogues who were loyal to the mission. To be honest, it didn’t sound half bad to Sam, but he hadn’t had the time nor the nerve to call the number Fury gave him. Not to mention, he and Bucky hadn’t even discussed it yet, and as far as Sam was concerned, Bucky was still on the fence about this whole hero gig. 

“What would you have done if I was found guilty?” Bucky asks after a moment, voice low and raspy. Sam’s forehead creases with worry. 

“What would you have wanted me to do?”

Bucky lifts his head, but doesn’t look at Sam, instead, he stares straight ahead down the stairwell. 

“Move on, find someone you could settle down with, maybe have a family.”

“I don’t think I could do that after having known you.”

Bucky takes another drag. “Isn’t that what you thought after Riley?”

Sam’s heart clenches with confusion and a little bit of resentment towards Bucky for bringing this up. That wasn’t fair of him to do. “Why are you asking me that? You’re not guilty, Buck. You have your freedom now.”

Bucky finally looks towards Sam, eyes heavy, sunken deep with sleeplessness and countless other things that Sam couldn’t quite decipher.   
“It’s funny, they say I’m not guilty, so then why do I feel like I am?”

Sam shakes his head helplessly. “I don’t know,” he says quietly, distracted with wondering what’s going through Bucky’s head. “You know you can’t blame yourself for the things they made you do, right?”

Bucky just shrugs his shoulders and takes another puff off the cigarette. He was more than grateful for all the work Shuri and her team had done for him while he was under Wakanda’s care, but one of the downsides of their brain unscrambling was that Bucky now remembers everything. Every one of his victims faces, every time he pulled a trigger or snapped a neck like it was nothing. They plagued his dreams night after night, and for the past few months, he found sleep deprivation a better alternative than dreaming of them. 

“I care about your well being too much,” Sam says, plucking the cigarette from Bucky’s hand and putting it out on the step. “So stop smoking these. I shouldn’t even have them in the house.”

Bucky looks down at the little pile of ash on the step below him. “You should get back to bed,” he responds quietly. 

“You coming?” Sam asks. Bucky looks up, catching the pleading look in Sam’s eyes. He looks at Sam for a moment,  _ really  _ looks at Sam, and then, finally, he hands Sam the pack of cigarettes and stands up. 

“Yeah. C’mon, let’s go.” He takes hold of Sam’s hand and helps him up. Once Sam’s on his feet, Bucky wraps an arm around his waist and dips his chin to kiss Sam. “I’m sorry if I worried you. I’m just…” Bucky sighs and closes his eyes, unsure how to explain what he’s feeling. 

“I know,” Sam says softly. “It’s ok that we don’t have everything figured out yet, but we will. I promise.”

Bucky grimaces, trying for a smile. “I love you.” The words nearly get caught in his throat. They still feel foreign to him, even though he’s been saying them to Sam on and off for years, and even though the feeling was never lost on him. 

“I love you, too.” Sam wraps a hand around Bucky’s neck and kisses his forehead. “C’mon, let’s go back to bed.” 

When they get back up to their apartment, Sam buries the carton of cigarettes in the trash can, vowing to never have them in the house again. 

The next morning, Sam calls Sarah. It had been the first thing he’d done after they all came back. 

The first call was frantic and full of questions and tearful reunions. Sam had learned that Sarah and Tess survived the snap, but Jody was taken, returned to them five years later, just like everyone else. And like everyone else, there was an expected adjustment period. Unfortunately, it had been six months and Jody didn’t seem to be adjusting at all. At times he was quiet and closed off, and at other times he was temperamental and quick to anger. Sarah says he lashed out at both her and Tess unprompted several times. 

Sam couldn’t exactly say he blamed the kid. Going through something like this changes a person for good, and the ones who stayed will never quite know. 

Sam sighs and runs a hand over his face. He sets his phone on the bedside table and shuts his eyes, hands shaking lightly. 

“Sam? Hey, what’s wrong?” 

Sam looks up to see Bucky, fresh from his shower, hair still damp. 

“Nothing.” Sam shakes his head. “It’s ok.”

Bucky sits beside Sam on the edge of the bed, covering Sam’s hand with his own. 

“What did Sarah say?” 

Sam keeps his eyes on the floor as a long breath escapes his lips. 

“Jody’s still adjusting, but it hasn’t been easy.”

“I can’t imagine what he’s going through. I mean, he comes back and his little sister is three years older than him, that has to mess a person up.”

“Yeah.” Sam sighs. “And it doesn’t help that Tess is 300 miles away at college. They’ve only seen each other once since Jody came back, and Sarah said they fought the entire time.”

Bucky frowns. He remembers the sweet little kids he’d met all those years ago, how well they got along. He can’t imagine them fighting. 

Sam sighs heavily, running his hands over his face. “I have to go,” he says. “Just for a few days. Tess is on break and she’s flying in to Harlem in two days. This is the only time I’ll be able to see them all for awhile. With the trial and everything else that’s happened since we came back, I haven’t had time, but I need to now.”

Bucky nods in understanding. 

“Do whatever you need to do.”

Sam looks up, eyebrows furrowed. “You make it sound like you won’t be coming with me.”

Bucky shakes his head. “I don’t think I should. This is important, they’re your family, you need some time with them.”

Sam sighs, but nods his head. “Maybe you’re right.” He leans over and kisses Bucky gently. “I would feel bad leaving you here by yourself.”

Bucky’s lips pull up into a small, reassuring smile. 

“Don’t worry about me. I have somewhere to be, too.”


	2. Family Matters

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam travels to New York to see his family while Bucky visits an old friend and receives some advice about a concern he and Sam unknowingly share. Sam has a few heartfelt conversations with his sister and nephew, and is forced to reflect on his relationship with Bucky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: mention of suicidal thoughts, depression, and ptsd

Two days later, Bucky sees Sam off at the airport and then catches his own flight to Missouri. The flight wasn’t bad, it was the nerves that had Bucky feeling like he might throw up. He was starting to have second thoughts. 

Bucky stared out the taxi window at the passing trees. His metal fingers fidgeted on his knee as he glanced over at the bouquet of fresh flowers lying on the seat beside him. 

Maybe this wasn’t a good idea. 

The car slows to a stop and Bucky pays the driver.

“Goin’ to see your girl?” the driver asks, glancing at the flowers. 

“Just a friend,” Bucky says with a tight smile. He grabs the flowers before exiting the car. 

He starts down the long driveway and soon enough he’s at the front door. His stomach is in knots, and with a deep breath, he raises his fist and knocks on the door. 

In a few seconds the door swings open and a little boy stands there. He looks up at Bucky quizzically. 

“Hi, is your dad here?” Bucky asks. He realized he must look weird standing there with a bouquet of flowers, asking for this little boy’s father. 

The boy doesn’t say anything, instead he runs away. Bucky sighs, but within a few seconds the door opens again and Clint is looking at him in question. 

“Bucky?”

Bucky shifts on his feet. “I’m sorry for showing up unannounced, but with the trial and everything, I never got to visit her.”

Clint looks apprehensive, but he nods in understanding. 

“I’ll show you to her.”

Bucky stands by himself, staring down at the gravestone. Clint had left him there to be in private. 

He kneels in the damp grass and sets the flowers below the gravestone. 

“Hey, Nat,” he says quietly. “Sorry about not visiting earlier, but I thought you’d understand.” Bucky exhales heavily. “I know you’d probably rather see Sam, but he’s away, seeing his family.”

The wind rustles through the trees, making a low whistling sound. Bucky looks down as his eyes flutter shut. “I’m worried about him. I know things are different now, but  _ we _ feel different. I remember how it was when we were first together, now it just feels like…” Bucky sighs and shakes his head. “...like he’s fulfilling some kind of obligation to me. I hate this feeling that he knows he would be better without me, but he’s too good a man to leave me. I don’t want him to stay if there’s something—some _ one _ better for him. I just want him to be happy.”

Bucky scoffs and picks at a patch of grass. “If you were here you’d probably kick my ass and tell me to tell Sam how I’m feeling.” Bucky looks up, placing his hand on the top of Natasha’s gravestones. “We really miss you, Nat. All of us. You deserved better.”

Behind him, Bucky hears leaves crunching as Clint approaches. 

“I didn’t know you two were so close.”

Bucky looks up. “She used to visit me in Wakanda. She was actually the reason I took another chance with Sam.” 

“Where is Sam, anyways?”

“Visiting family. He had some things to sort out.” 

Clint kneels beside Bucky. “Yeah, I heard about Jody.”

Bucky looks up, but Clint’s eyes are on Nat’s gravestone. 

“Did your family have a hard time adjusting after they came back?”

Clint shrugs. “They don’t remember those five years, all they know is that they came back and I was five years older. I think I had a harder time adjusting than they did.”

“How did you?”

Clint doesn’t answer for a minute. His eyes flicker from the stone up to the sky. “I’m still working on it. It’s not the people being back that’s taking time to adjust to, it’s the people who didn’t come back.” He looks back to Natasha’s gravestone. “I guess all I can do is continue living and carry on her memory, make sure people don’t forget what she did.”

“We won’t forget her. We won’t forget either of them.”

There’s a short silence before Clint speaks again. “Where are you staying?”

“I got a hotel in the city, it’s about a half hour drive from here.”

Clint stands up and dusts his knees off. “Stay for dinner,” he offers. “Laura’s making lasagna.”

Bucky gives Clint an apprehensive look. “Are you sure you—”

“Want you near my kids?” Clint finishes and Bucky looks down. 

“Yeah.”

“You’re one of the few people I’d trust to watch my back, in fact, you have a few times, so yeah, I’m sure.” Clint holds out his hand and Bucky hesitantly takes it. 

“Thank you,” he says when he’s on his feet. 

“If Nat thought of you as a friend, then so do I.”

Bucky smiles gratefully at the small comfort the sentiment brought him. 

Bucky sits beside Lila and Nathaniel at the dinner table. Nathaniel, the youngest, was enthralled by Bucky’s metal arm. He kept touching it and asking Bucky questions about it. Laura scolded him and apologized to Bucky, but Bucky really didn’t mind. He let Nathaniel move his fingers and bend his arm at the elbow, smiling the whole time. 

“So, how’s Sam doing?” Laura asks as she takes a bite of her dinner. “I know things have been crazy with the trial, how’s he handling everything?”

Bucky shrugs. 

“Things haven’t been easy, but they haven’t been for anyone.” He smiles weakly. “We’re managing. Figuring things out.”

Laura offers a look of sympathy. “If you ever need anything, don’t be afraid to reach out.” 

Bucky smiles gratefully. “Thank you. The same goes for you all.”

Nathaniel pulls at one of Bucky’s metal fingers, laughing to himself. 

“What’s so funny?” Bucky asks playfully. 

Nathaniel simply laughs again, and Bucky smiles down at him. 

“Does it hurt?” Nathaniel asks as he pulls Bucky’s fingers. 

“Not really. I can kind of feel it, but it’s not like my real hand.”

Nathaniel looks at him in wonder. 

“So when I do this…” he pinches at Bucky’s hand. “did you feel it?” He looks up at Bucky with wide eyes. 

“Yeah. But it doesn’t hurt.”

Nathaniel continues pinching and pulling at Bucky’s hand. 

“Nathaniel, leave him alone,” Laura scolds. Nathaniel frowns. 

“It’s ok, really,” Bucky says. “His curiosity is refreshing.”

Laura smiles. “Have you and Sam talked about kids?”

Bucky looks down and smiles at Nathaniel, if only to avoid eye contact with Laura. 

“We talked about it before everything happened, but... I don’t know anymore.” Bucky pulls his hand back playfully, and Nathaniel laughs. 

And as Nathaniel continues playing with his hand, he’s painfully reminded how much he wanted a life like this before things got so complicated. 

Clint walks Bucky out to the porch after dinner. A taxi is waiting at the end of the drive. 

“Thank you for having me,” Bucky says with a small, unthreatening smile. 

“It’s no trouble.” Clint shrugs. “I’m glad to see you doing well, considering everything.”

Bucky grimaces. “Thanks.”

“And about your troubles with Sam—”

Bucky looks up, surprise written on his face. 

“I didn’t mean to hear when you were talking to Nat, but I did.”

Bucky puts his hands in his pockets and squares his shoulders. 

“I don’t know everything that went down between you guys, but I do know you’re not a burden to Sam. You’re what’s helped him get through a lot of shit. So, if you’re really feeling that way, talk to him. You both deserve to be happy after everything you’ve been through.” Clint gently pats Bucky on the shoulder. “It was good to see you, Bucky.”

Bucky genuinely smiles this time. 

“You, too. Take care, Clint.”

As Bucky walks down the drive, he looks back to see Clint’s family coming out of the house and waving to him. He smiles and waves back before getting in the taxi, watching as they disappear from view. 

  
  


Sam steps off the escalator and looks around the crowded airport for his sister. Before he even sees her, he hears her voice calling his name. 

“Sam! Sammy!” 

His head swivels to the right where he sees Sarah running towards him, a smile spread across her face. His own face lights up when he sees her, and he can’t stop himself from running across the airport to meet her in the middle. They collide, falling into a bone-crushing hug, neither willing to let go first. 

“Lord, you have no idea how happy I am to see you,” Sarah says on an exhale. Sam could imagine, because he’d been missing her since the moment he came back. 

“I missed you,” Sam tells her, still clinging to her. “So,  _ so  _ much.”

Sarah finally releases her hold on her brother, only enough to pull back and look at him. She holds him by the arms, just above his elbows, and studies him with fondness. Sam takes the opportunity to look at her as well. Sarah had always aged gracefully, and she was as beautiful as ever, but Sam could see the results of years of stress, overworking, and raising kids. The small, dark bags under her eyes that resembled tiredness, and not just from a few sleepless nights. This was a deeper kind of tired, one that Sam understood all too well, one that made him ache to think his sister had to withstand it as well. The past years had not proved kind to Sarah Wilson, and Sam was afraid she couldn’t take much more. 

“This is new,” Sarah says after a moment as she reaches up to touch his beard. Sam laughs, not bothering to blink away the tears in his eyes.

“Yeah, well, got no time to shave.” He shrugs. “And I kinda like it.”

Sarah smiles, holding her brother’s face between her palms. Her hands tremble slightly with emotion, and Sam gathers her into another hug, softer this time, with an unspoken understanding between them. 

After a few more tearful minutes, the siblings gather Sam’s luggage and make it to Sarah’s car. She starts toward her apartment, and they fall into conversation. Sam asks about Jody and Tess, and Sarah’s expression shifts. Her hands tighten around the steering wheel and Sam notices the way her eyes look a little sadder than before. She loved those kids with everything she had, Sam couldn’t imagine how hard this whole thing had been on her. 

“It wasn’t easy...when everyone disappeared. You, Jody...but when he came back to me, when you both did, I must have cried for a week straight. I was so overcome with happiness, I wasn’t even sure what to do with it.” She smiles, but it’s bittersweet. “I showered Jody with love, let him know how much I missed him, that I thought about him everyday he was gone…but he just seemed…” Sarah shakes her head as she searches for the right word. “He was numb to the new world. There were so many changes, and it was overwhelming for him, so he just...shut down.”

Sam nods as he listens. He had felt the same way after he came back, and he was sure Bucky did, too. Sometimes he still felt it, and sometimes it was so intense that he wanted everything to just stop again. Like it had for those five years he was gone. It was hard to explain, but that feeling, that...nothingness, at times it seemed more inviting than the reality they had all been dropped into unwillingly. The thoughts that normally led to, they weren’t pretty, and he hated the idea that Jody was feeling this way as well.

When they reach Sarah’s apartment, Sam is nearly itching to see his niece and nephew. Sarah unlocks the door and lets them both inside. The apartment looked almost the same as Sam had remembered. It was good to know some things hadn’t changed. 

“Uncle Sam!” 

Sam’s smile widens when he sees Tess, and a new batch of tears well up in his eyes. He throws his arms around her, not used to her being just a few inches shorter than himself. 

“God, you’re all grown up,” Sam says tearfully. He holds her by the shoulders and takes a good look at her. 

“Shut up,” Tess says, giggling. “You sound so old when you say that.”

Sam grins. “Well, technically I should be in my forties right now.”

Tess’ lips pull into a joyous grin. “I missed you so much,” she says before hugging him again. Over Tess’ shoulder, Sam sees Jody just as he comes out of his bedroom. His face, once blank and unreadable, forms a smile when he sees his uncle. He runs towards Sam, laughing when they crash into a tight hug. 

“Jesus, I missed you, Sam,” he says, letting out a sharp breath. He wraps his arms around his uncle’s shoulders to pull him closer. Sam smiles, letting Jody hug him for as long as he needed. 

“I missed you too, kid,” he says, messing Jody’s hair. “Now, how about you help me bring my luggage in. Your mom said I’m staying in your room since Tess is in the guest room.”

Jody just nods and grabs for Sam’s suitcase, and as he does, Sam catches the look he gives Tess. It’s just a narrowing of his eyes, but it doesn’t go unnoticed by Sam or Sarah. Neither says anything, but Sarah raises a brow, and Sam knows she means for him to talk to Jody. 

He ushers Jody towards the bedroom, closing the door when they’re both inside. Jody lifts Sam’s suitcase onto his bed, dropping down beside it. Sam takes a breath and sits beside him. 

“So, you wanna talk about that?”

Jody looks up, brows furrowed. 

“About what?”

“That look you gave your sister,” Sam says with a snort. “The look that everyone saw just now. What was that about?”

Jody huffs through his nose and looks ahead, flexing his hands. “She treats me like a fucking kid all the time—”

“Hey,” Sam says, reprimanding him for swearing. 

“See, that’s what I’m talking about,” Jody says, scoffing. “I should’ve known you would, too.”

Sam sighs, closing his eyes as he shakes his head. “I’m sorry. You’re not a little kid, but you are her little brother now. This is weird for her, too.”

“I’m not her little brother,” Jody says, shaking his head defiantly. “She may be twenty one while I’m still eighteen, but she’s—” Jody pauses and looks down at his hands resting in his lap. “She’s still my little sister. Still the girl I watched grow up until I wasn’t here anymore.” He scoffs lightly. “I should be twenty three right now.”

“And I should be in my forties by now,” Sam replies. “I get where you’re coming from, but you can’t be angry at them because of it. Nobody asked for this.”

“And I never asked to come back.”

Sam looks up, worry written across his face. 

“Jody, don’t say that. Please, don’t ever say that.”

Jody shrugs helplessly. “What am I supposed to say?” He shudders as tears well in his eyes. “Mom and Tess—they had moved on, they didn’t need me back.”

“Yes, they did,” Sam says, voice laced with sincerity. He reaches for Jody’s arm, and Jody looks up to meet his eyes. “They need you here— _ I  _ need you here. You’re wanted, and we love you just the same as before.”

Jody swallows, wincing when a tear slips down his cheek. Inside his chest, his heart clenches painfully. 

“I don’t wanna be here,” he admits with a broken sob. “I want it back.”

“Want what back?” Sam asks gently. Jody sniffles, his lips trembling as he tries to hold back his tears. 

“That darkness. That...nothingness. I want that back. At least I was at peace then.”

Sam’s heart breaks as he listens to his nephew; this poor boy who had done nothing to deserve these kinds of feelings. He wraps Jody in his arms, lets him sob into his shirt until the shoulder of it is damp, until Jody has stopped shaking so violently and it’s only an occasional shudder in between breaths. 

“You gotta get help, man,” Sam tells him, voice low, but no less serious because of it. Jody looks down in shame. 

“I’m not gonna do anything about it, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“But you thought about it, haven’t you? Thought about what it’d be like to take your life with your own hands this time. Might feel more in control if it happened that way, right?”

Jody keeps his eyes on the floor, his shoulders still shaking slightly from crying. “Course I thought about it,” he admits quietly. “I couldn’t break mom’s heart like that, but I...I just want this feeling to stop.”

Sam’s eyes burn with tears for his nephew. He doesn’t bother blinking them away this time. He readjusts himself on the mattress, clearing his throat before speaking. 

“Believe it or not, I understand the feeling.”

Jody gives him a quizzical look and he elaborates. “You have good and bad days, and even the good days aren’t great sometimes, and you find yourself asking  _ ‘it gets easier, right?’ _ And when it doesn’t seem to be getting better, when the bad days keep coming and the good days become fewer and fewer, it’s easier to give in to those thoughts than it is to fight them any longer. The promise of no more pain is inviting, trust me, I understand. But life isn’t all pain, Jody, I can promise you that as well, and when your hardest days are over, you’ll thank yourself for hanging on.”

Jody mulls over his uncle’s words, his jaw clenching slightly.

“When are the hardest days over?” he asks. “Because since I came back it feels like everyday it gets harder to convince myself there’s enough reasons to stay.”

Sam lowers his head, sighing gently. 

“I can give you a hundred reasons, but you gotta find your own reasons. You gotta do this for yourself.” He holds Jody’s gaze as he says the following words: “You have to stay alive for yourself, otherwise you’re gonna start running out of reasons real soon.”

  
  


By the time Bucky gets to the hotel, it’s nearly eleven o’clock. He sets his bag on the bed and kicks his shoes off. He pulls his phone from his pocket and clicks on Sam’s number. It rings three times before Sam answers. 

“Hey, Buck.”

Bucky can hear the tiredness in Sam’s voice, and it makes his heart ache a little more. 

“Hey, how’s it going up there?”

Sam sighs. “It’s...it’s ok.”

Bucky frowns. He falls back onto the bed, staring up at the ceiling 

“Tell me, Sam.” He closes his eyes. “You know you can, right?”

“I know, Buck.” There’s a short silence before Sam continues. “Jody’s doing worse than I thought. He’s having some really dark thoughts, but I recommend a counselor friend I used to know when I lived in New York. She’s great and I really think she can help him.”

“That’s good news,” Bucky says with a small smile. “I’m really sorry about Jody, I can only imagine what’s going through his head.”

Sam hums in response, his heart still heavy from all the day had thrown at him. 

“I wish I could do something.” Bucky reaches up and pushes his hair back, exhaling deeply as he does. 

“Just hearing your voice is helping, trust me.”

Bucky lets a small smile tug at his lips. A short silence stretches between them. 

“I love you, Sam,” Bucky says after a moment. 

On the other side of the line, Sam smiles. 

“I love you, too, Buck.”

Bucky looks up at the ceiling, drawing a deep breath. Now wasn’t the time to do this. Sam had family matters, Bucky didn’t need to add stress by asking if they could talk. It could wait. 

“So I’ll see you Monday?” He feels a pang in his chest as he pushes away the nagging in his brain telling him to talk to Sam. 

“Yeah,” Sam confirms. “Goodnight, Buck.”

“Night, Sam.”

Bucky ends the call and holds the phone to his chest, ignoring the dull ache that's left there as he lies in silence. 

Sam sets his phone facedown on the kitchen table just as Sarah places a steaming mug in front of him. He looks down into the pool of green tea, bobbing the tea bag around a few times. Sarah sits quietly across from him, eyeing him carefully. 

“So, how’re things with Bucky?” she asks, taking a sip out of her own mug. Sam lifts his face, blinking a few times to adjust to the dim light that surrounded them in Sarah’s small kitchen. 

“They’re…they’re good.”

Sarah raises a brow. “That was convincing,” she says, sarcasm dripping from her voice. “Really, how are things?”

Sam takes a long sip, shrugging lightly as he sets the mug down, keeping his eyes on it. “They’re just different.”

“Different how?” Sarah asks gently. 

“I don’t know,” Sam replies with a sigh. “Everything’s just up in the air right now, maybe once things settle down a bit and we get more accustomed to the world, it might feel different.”

Sarah tilts her head to the side, examining Sam’s closed off demeanor. “Are you fighting?”

Sam looks up, eyes wide. “No! No, nothing like that. It’s just…”

“Not the same as before,” Sarah finishes for him. Sam nods, the guilt tearing away at him for admitting it. 

“And I know relationships change and they evolve, especially with everything we’ve both been through, and I feel so guilty for even wishing it was the same as before, because that wasn’t perfect either. But it was  _ easier _ , and we both deserve a goddamn break.”

Sarah’s gaze softens as she reaches across the table for her brother’s hand. “You do deserve a break, but you have to think about your future, and if he’s a part of it. You need to make sure you’re not holding back because of the past between you two...the one where he left you.”

Sam swallows harshly, forcing down the growing lump in his throat. “I still love him, Sarah.”

Her shoulders fall with a heavy, heartfelt sigh. “I know, but is it enough? Are you happy, Sam?”

He weighs the question in his mind for a moment before answering. “I’m always happy when I’m with him, but it just feels like there’s this distance between us lately. Like, the morning after his trial ended, I found him on the steps smoking a cigarette. He never smoked when we were together before, and he was just acting...off.” Sam shakes his head, unsure if this made any sense to Sarah at all. 

“He’s been through a lot,” says Sarah. “And so have you. Together and separate, you’ve both endured some pretty heavy shit.” She pauses, a small smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “I remember when you brought him for Christmas, it was the happiest I’d seen you in years, and he was so good for you, Sam.” She sets her mug down, looking pointedly at her brother. “I guess you have to ask yourself if you’re both still benefiting from this relationship.”

Sam’s gaze falls again to the liquid inside his mug. He mulls over the statement, playing it over again in his head. He liked to think that he and Bucky had both grown immensely since their first meeting all those years ago, and he knew he had changed over the years, both with Bucky and apart from him. 

“Sam?” Sarah says, her voice quiet, laced with concern. Sam glances up, taking a quick sip of his tea. 

“Hmm?” he asks over the brim of his cup. 

“Are you afraid he’s going to leave again?”

Sam freezes momentarily. He looks across the table, staring at Sarah with widened eyes before slowly setting his mug down. He keeps his hands wrapped around it, feeling the warmth radiating off of it and into his hands, and he nods his head. 

“I-maybe...I think so.”


End file.
